MS Power Point

PowerPoint is the powerful and ubiquitous presentation program from Microsoft. It gives you the facility to create stunning presentations that incorporate video and PowerPoint animations. The image editing capabilities that PowerPoint offer get better and better with every new version. Starting to learn Microsoft PowerPoint can seem like a daunting task if you are not familiar with its environment. The tutorials you see listed on this page are designed to take beginners by the hand and to teach them the basics of using the program. As you gain confidence, more advanced subjects will be explained. Before you know it, you'll be a Microsoft PowerPoint guru and you'll be helping out other people who are beginners themselves.
These PowerPoint tutorials are still being worked on, so stay tuned for their completion!

Creating A New And Opening An Existing Presentation

• Creating A New Presentation
• Creating A New Presentation Based On A Template
• Opening An Existing Presentation

PowerPoint Basic Tasks

• Adding New Slides
• Deleting Slides
• Moving Slides
• PowerPoint Views
• Modifying Backgrounds

Templates

• Applying PowerPoint Templates
• Creating Your Own PowerPoint Template

PowerPoint Text

• Using Textboxes
• Content Placeholders
• Formatting Text

Graphics

• Insert PowerPoint Image
• Using Clipart Images
• PowerPoint Transitions
• Creating Animations
• Adding Sounds

Miscellaneous PowerPoint Tasks

• PowerPoint Spell Check
• Running The Slideshow
• Pointer Options
• Saving Presentations
• Saving As A Web Page
• Printing Presentations

=> Creating A New And Opening An Existing Presentation

• Creating A New PowerPoint Presentation From Scratch

There are a variety of ways of creating your PowerPoint presentation, and one of them is to start from scratch. In doing so, you are creating your presentation from a blank presentation, and you have much more flexibility over how it looks. In another tutorial, we will look at how to create a presentation using templates, but for now, to start from scratch click the File tab > New, and the following panel will be displayed (click the image to see a larger version).

Ensure that Blank presentation is selected. You can click on the thumbnail image to select it if it isn't, and then click Create (see hints in the image above). A new presentation based on a blank presentation opens for you to start work on. As soon as you can, save the presentation so you don't lose any changes. Learn how to save your presentation.
If you want to sacrifice flexibility for speed, you may prefer instead to create a presentation using a template.

Creating A New Presentation Based On A Template

One way of creating a presentation is to start from scratch. However, you can save time and effort if you base your new presentation on a template. A template defines the background, font styles, colors and sizes for your placeholders, as well as selected bullets that match the template. Using a template means that you don't need to worry about defining those aspects yourself. PowerPoint comes with a number of stylish templates built in that you can use immediately, and you can download additional ones from office.com.
To create a PowerPoint presentation using a template, click the File tab > New, and the following panel will be displayed.
Clicking on a template category will display thumbnail images of all the templates within that category. When you find a template you like the look of, click on its thumbnail to select it and you will see a preview of it on the right of the panel. You can then click Create to create your PowerPoint presentation based on this template.
Sometimes you just can't find a template that precisely matches what you need, and in these circumstances, what many people do is use a template that is the closest fit and then modify it.
There are many free templates available from within PowerPoint, and also freely downloadable from other websites on the internet. In addition to using those that ship with PowerPoint, you can also purchase stylish and professionally designed templates for PowerPoint presentations from vendors like Smile Templates.

• Open Existing Presentations          

There are several reasons why you might need to open an existing Microsoft PowerPoint presentation instead of creating a new one. You might have previously saved an incomplete presentation and now need to dos ome more work on it. Alternatively, you might want to open a complete presentation and actually run it for an audience. Whatever the reason, opening an existing presentation is quite easy.
Start PowerPoint and then click the File tab > Open. The usual Open file dialogue box that you may already be familiar with opens and you use this to locate your presentation.

When you find your presentation, either double click it to open it, or select it and then click Open. The presentation will then open for you to either work on it or run it.
The keyboard shortcut for opening a presentation the same as that for opening existing documents in other Microsoft Office programs: ctrl-o.

=> PowerPoint Basic Tasks

• Adding New Slides

There are a couple of ways to add a new slide. In each way, the slide that is currently selected is important as the new slide will be placed after the selected one. This means that if you want to insert a slide before the end of the presentation, you will need to select the slide that appears before the one you want to insert. To select the slide, just click on it. You can select the slide in whichever view you happen to be using, whether it's Slides View or Outline View.
Once you have selected a slide, click Home > Slides > New Slide. You'll notice that the New Slide button is in two halves.
If you click the top half of the New Slide button, the default Title and Content type slide will be added. If, instead, you click the bottom half of the button, you will be able to select what type of slide is added.
Once the new slide has been added, you can click into one of the editable content boxes to make your changes.
The keyboard shortcut for adding new slides is ctrl-m.

• Deleting Slides

Getting Rid Of Slides We Don't Want

Now that you've learned how to add slides to a presentation, the time has come to learn how to delete unwanted slides. Deleting slides can be performed in three ways. Select the slide and then

• Press the delete key on the keyboard
• Pres the backspace key on the keyboard
• Right click on the slide and select Delete Slide

Also, there are a variety of places that you can delete the slide in question. The easiest way is to work in Normal View (on the View tab, in the Presentation Views group, click Normal). You can then work on either Slides or Outline tab: find and select the slide you want to delete and then press the delete key. You can select multiple slides by holding down the control key as you click on additional slides. If you press the delete key now, you will delete all the selected slides. If you have a group of slides that run in sequence, you can select them all by selecting the first one and then holding down the shift key whilst you click on the last slide.
If you have many slides to delete, you may find it easier from an organizational point of view to work in Slide Sorter View (read all about PowerPoint Views). The same process applies: select single or multiple slides and then press the delete key.

• Moving Slides In PowerPoint

You've spent time planning how you want your presentation to look and you've painstakingly designed it's look and feel. You've taken great care with every stylish slide you've added. But oh oh, you know see that slide 6 actually belongs before slide 5! What do you do, start again from scratch? There is no need. All you have to do is move the slide. You can change the sequence of your slides by moving them around your presentation.

To move a slide in your presentation, all you have to do is drag and drop it where you need it. As you drag the slide, you should see an insertion point that looks like either a horizontal or vertical line, depending on which PowerPoint view you are using, that tells you where your slide will appear.
If you have many slides to move around, and want to get an overall view of how your slides are organized, using the Slide sorter view is your best option.
You can move several slides around as a group by selecting them all first and then dragging and dropping them. To select multiple slides, hold down the control key on your keyboard as you click on additional slides. Alternatively, if the slides you need to select occur in an unbroken sequence, you can select the first slide and then hold down the shift key as you click on the last slide.

Moving Slides With Keyboard Shortcuts

Another way to move slides around is to cut and paste them. Select the slide(s) you want to move and then right click > Cut. Select the slide that is positioned before where you want the slide to go and then right click > Paste. The slide(s) will appear after the selected slide. If you want to speed things up, you can use keyboard shortcuts: select the slide you want to move, press ctrl-x to cut it and then ctrl-v to paste it.
Dragging and dropping your slides is probably the easiest method to use.

The Six Different PowerPoint Views

There are 6 different views you can use to look at your PowerPoint presentation and each one has its advantages over the others. The default view in PowerPoint is normal view. This means that when you start PowerPoint, and as lond as you don't change the view, you will be working in Normal View. There are two place to change to a different view: at the top of the left side panel and at the bottom of the workspace to the right (next to the zoom slider). OK, make that three, as you can also see the presentation views on the View tab!

To change to Slides View or Outline view, click the corresponding tab at the top of the left side panel:

To change to any of the other PowerPoint view, use the small toolbar at the bottom:

Here is an explanation of how you should use the different views:

PowerPoint View	Description
Slides View	This is a great place to view the slides in your presentation as thumbnail-sized images while you edit. The thumbnails make it easy for you to navigate through your presentation and to see the effects of any design changes. You can also easily rearrange, add, or delete slides here
Outline View	This is a great place to start writing your content, to capture your ideas, plan how you want to present them, and move slides and text around. The Outline tab shows your slide text in outline form.
Normal View	Normal view is the main editing view, where you write and design your presentations.
Slide Sorter View	Slide Sorter view gives you a view of your slides in thumbnail form. This view makes it easy for you to sort and organize the sequence of your slides as you create your presentation, and then also as you prepare your presentation for printing.
Reading View	Use reading view to deliver your presentation not to an audience (via a large screen, for example), but instead to someone viewing your presentation on their own computer. Or, use Reading view on your own computer when you want to view a presentation not in full-screen Slide Show view, but in a window with simple controls that make the presentation easy to review. You can always switch from Reading view to one of the other views if you want to change the presentation.
Slide Show View	Use Slide Show view to deliver your presentation to your audience. Slide Show view occupies the full computer screen, exactly like an actual presentation. In this view, you see your presentation the way your audience will. You can see how your graphics, timings, movies, animated effects, and transition effects will look during the actual presentation.

• PowerPoint Background

Creating A PowerPoint Background

For the background to your PowerPoint presentation, you can specify the following:

• A solid fill
• A gradient fill
• A picture or texture fill
• A Pattern fill

To change your presentation background, click Design > Background > Background Styles > Format Background. Alternatively, you can right click on a free area on a slide (and area that doesn't contain an object) and then select Format Background from there.
You should now see the Format Background window.

Ensure that the fill tab is selected (as in the image above) and then make changes according to what kind of background you want for your presentation.

Solid Fill

To specify a solid fill colour, ensure that the appropriate radio button is selected and then click on the Fill Colour swatch. A panel is displayed for you to select a colour.

The colours in the main part of the grid are all theme colours, so if you select one, you can be pretty confident that the background will blend in well with the rest of the presentation's colours. At the bottom of the colour selection panel are standard colours and if you want even more colours to choose from, you can click More Colours at the bottom.

Gradient Fill

A gradient is the smooth transition of one colour into another.

When this option is selected, you can choose from a selection of ready made gradients by clicking on the Preset colours button. Alternatively, you can exercise more control by defining the gradient yourself. If you do this, you will need to tell PowerPoint whether the gradient is linear, radial, rectangular, path or shade from title. Additionally you will need to specify the gradient direction, angle, where the colours are positioned on the gradient (with the Gradient stops) and the properties of each colour in the gradient. These properties include what the colour is, how bright its is and also how transparent.

Picture Or Texture Fill

When specifying a picture or texture fill for your PowerPoint background, you are actually using a picture as the background.

PowerPoint comes with some built in textures you can use, or you can select an image that is stored on your hard drive. When you select an image in this way, you can choose to have the image appearing just once in the background, or to have it repeating like a texture. As you can see from the screenshot, there are many other attributes you can set that control the picture's appearance.

Pattern Fill

As with textures, PowerPoint ships with a selection of pre-made patterns that you can use as your background.

Patterns available for selection include dots, stripes, zig zags, brickwork and many more. You can specify whatever foreground and background colours you want to use.

Resetting The PowerPoint Background

If you decide to reset your background, but you've made so many changes that it would take too long to reverse each one, you can use the Reset Background button at the bottom of the Format Background window. You can also tell PowerPoint to apply the background you just designed to all slides in the presentation - using the Apply to All button. If you don't apply the background to all slides, then only the currently selected slide is affected.

=> PowerPoint Textbox

Adding A Textbox In PowerPoint          

When adding text to their PowerPoint presentations, many people limit themselves to using only the placeholder boxes that are present by default when you add a new slide. For example, when you add a title and content slide, there is always a title placeholder in which you will see the words "Click to add title" and a content placeholder that displays the words "Click to add text". It's then a simple case of clicking into each of those boxes and then typing your content.
However, another way of adding text that gives you more flexibility over positioning is to add a textbox. Click Insert > Text > Text Box, and the cursor will change to this shape:
Left click with the mouse and drag out the textbox. Once the text box has been drawn, you can start typing in it. When you drag out your initial text box, it retains it's width, but the height contracts temporarily to be the height of one line of text. When you type multiple lines, the height will adjust to fit, but the width of the textbox will remain fixed.
This is what the textbox looks like:
You can see resizing handles at each corner and also halfway along each edge. You can resize the textbox by clicking and dragging on any of those handles.

Moving A Textbox In PowerPoint

Moving a textbox around in PowerPoint is as easy as drag and drop. If you are not careful, though, you will end up dragging the resizing handles. The first thing you have to do is select the textbox as a whole. To do this position the cursor over one edge of the textbox until you see a double headed cursor.
When you see the cursor change shape, click on the box. When the textbox is selected, the dashed bounding lines become solid lines, as shown below.
Now you can move the textbox around either by clicking and dragging with the mouse, or by pressing the arrow keys on your keyboard.
Now that you've learnt how to add textboxes to your PowerPoint presentations, why not spice them up by inserting images.

• Content Placeholders In PowerPoint

Placeholders

In Microsoft PowerPoint, placeholders are boxes with dotted borders that contain content and reside within a slide layout. All built-in slide layouts that come with PowerPoint contain content placeholders. If you click on the bottom half of the New Slide button, PowerPoint displays all the slide layouts you can insert, and on each you can see content placeholders.

If you insert a two content slide layout, for example, you will get three placeholders: one for the slide's title, and two for the content. To add you own text, click in a placeholder and start typing. You can style the text however you please, using the usual formatting options.

But how does PowerPoint know what placeholders should appear on each slide? This is determined by the slide master. If you click View > Master Views > Slide Master, you can see all the slide layouts available for use in your presentation. The layout on each is controlled by, among other things, the content placeholders on them.

Click on any slide layout to select it and you'll see the placeholders already present. You can add new placeholders by clicking Insert Placeholder in the Mater Layout group of the Slide Master tab. If you click the top half of the button, you'll add the same placeholder as you added last time, whereas if you click the bottom half, you get a choice of placeholders to add.

Usually, you won't add content placeholders to existing slide layouts (though you might). Placeholders are more useful when you create a new slide layout. We'll cover this in more detail in the Slide Master Tutorial.

• Formatting Text In PowerPoint

How To Format Text In PowerPoint

Most of the time, you will probably leave the text you type in your PowerPoint presentation as it is, without formatting it. However, sometimes you might like to style certain pieces of text so that it stands out.

To format some text, first of all select it. As you move the cursor, the mini toolbar appears as if by magic. The mini toolbar contains some of the more commonly used formatting commands that PowerPoint guesses you are likely to use. Using it, you can bold text, italicize it and do various other text formatting tasks, all at the click of a button. You will probably be familiar with all of the commands available on the mini toolbar, so we won't dwell on them.

If you want to apply more adventurous formatting, head over to the ribbon. When you select text, the Format contextual tab appears. On this tab are many different formatting functions. Let's get to grips with formatting text by running through a quick example.

Let's increase the font size and bold some text. To do that, all we have to do is select the text and then press ctrl-b. To increase the font size incrementally, press ctrl-shift->. You can keep pressing it until you get the right size, or select a specific font size from the ribbon. Click on the Format contextual tab and then click on the More button in WordArt styles.

Pick a style that you like and click to apply it. Alternatively, hover over a style to see a live preview applied temporarily. When you move the mouse away from the style, the live preview is removed. This is what I came up with when I applied a WordArt style:

That looks pretty good!

=> Graphics

• Insert PowerPoint Image

Inserting Images In PowerPoint

To insert an image in PowerPoint, click Insert > Images. You can see hat there are four different types of image you can insert here, and we'll explore each one now.

Insert A Picture

If you have an image, for example a photo you have taken, on your PC's hard drive, you would click on the Picture button. Then you would navigate to the place on your hard drive where the picture was located and either double click on it or select it and then click Insert.

Insert Clip Art

When you click the Clip Art button, the Clip Art panel opens on the right of the workspace.

We can use this panel to search for Clip Art images of certain things. In the image above, I searched for "telephone" and found four related images. To narrow down the search, you can click on the Results should be drop down list and select one of the categories of:

• Illustrations
• Photographs
• Videos
• Audios

To insert a Clip Art image, click on it.

Searching Clip Art In PowerPoint

PowerPoint provides a large selection of ready made Clip Art images. These images are simple in design but their use can really help get your point across in your presentation. One advantage of using Clip Art is that the collection of images is right there raedy for you to use. You don't have to go out and take photos for your presentation, and you don't have to touch Photoshop. When you click the Clip Art button, the Clip Art panel opens on the right of the workspace.

We can use this panel to search for Clip Art images of certain things. In the image above, I searched for "telephone" and found four related images. To narrow down the saerch, you can click on the Results should be drop down list and select one of the categories of:

• Illustrations
• Photographs
• Videos
• Audios

To insert a Clip Art image, click on it. You'll notice that the Picture Tools contextual tab appears in the ribbon to help you perform picture related tasks. This tab will remain visible as long as the item of Clip Art (or, indeed, any image) is selected.
If there isn't a big enough selection of Clip Art images for you here, you can always check the Include Office.com content checkbox when you search. Additionally, you can visit the site yourself by clicking the link at the bottom of the panel.
When you have finished working with Clip Art, you can close down the panel to reduce clutter by clicking the "x" in the top right corner.

MS Excel 2007

Topic One: What is Excel?

Topic Two: Getting Started

Topic Three: Creating a Simple Workbook

Topic Four: Writing Formulas Using Operators and Functions

Topic Five: Formatting The Appearance of a Workbook

Topic Six: Advanced Excel (Copying Cells)

Topic Seven: Linking Documents in Excel

Topic Eight: Creating Charts

Details : https://faculty.fuqua.duke.edu/~pecklund/ExcelReview/2001_Documents/2001XLGettingStarted.pdf

What is Excel?

Microsoft Excel is an electronic spreadsheet program.

You might of heard the terms "spreadsheet" and "worksheet". People generally use them interchangebly. To remain consistent with Microsoft and other publishers the term worksheet refers to the row-and-column matrix sheet on which you work upon and the term spreadsheet refers to this type of computer application. In addition, the term workbook will refer to the book of pages that is the standard Excel document.The workbook can contain worksheets,chart sheets, or macro modules.

---

The Spreadsheet Concept

---

The Workbook

Most of the Excel screen is devoted to the display of the workbook. The workbook consists of grids and columns. The intersection of a row and column is a rectangular area called a cell.

Cells

The workbook is made up of cells.There is a cell at the intersection of each row and column.A cell can contain a value, a formula, or a text entry. A text entry is used to label or explain the contents of the workbook. A value entry can either be a constant or the value of a formula. The value of a formula will change when the components (arguments) of the formula change. The appeal of spreadsheet programs is the ability to change one value and watch all other values that depend on that first value automatically change when the spreadsheet is recalculated.

Rows, Columns, and Sheets

The Excel worksheet contains 16,384 rows that extend down the worksheet, numbered 1 through 16384.

The Excel worksheet contains 256 columns that extend across the worksheet, lettered A through Z, AA through AZ, BA through BZ, and continuing to IA through IZ.

The Excel worksheet can contain as many as 256 sheets, labeled Sheet1 through Sheet256. The initial number of sheets in a workbook,which can be changed by the user is 16.

Cell References

Cell references are the combination of column letter and row number. For example, the upper-left cell of a worksheet is A1.

The Excel Window



You will learn about Excel's toolbars and entering information into a workbook in the next part of the tutorial.

Getting Started with Microsoft Excel

---

This handout introduces the basic features of Microsoft Excel, a spreadsheet program on Macintoshes and on computers running Microsoft Windows. The handout covers entering and editing data, formatting, formulas, page setup, and printing spreadsheets.

Starting Excel

---

You can start Excel by: 1. Double-clicking on the Microsoft Excel application icon. This application is usually in a folder called Excel. An alias for this icon appears on the desktop of the computers in the Student Microcomputer Facility.
2. Double-clicking on the icon of any Excel document. When you double-click an Excel document, Excel opens with the document already loaded.

Exploring the Excel Interface

---

Components of the Excel Window

Besides the usual window components (close box, title bar, scroll bars, etc.), an Excel window has several unique elements identified in the figure below.

Standard Toolbar

The Standard toolbar, located beneath the menu bar, has buttons for commonly performed tasks like adding a column of numbers, printing, sorting, and other operations. Excel let's you customize the toolbar or even display multiple toolbars at the same time. The Standard Excel XP toolbar appears in the figure below.

Formatting toolbar

The Formatting toolbar, located beneath the Standard toolbar bar, has buttons for various formatting operations like changing text size or style, formatting numbers and placing borders around cells.

Formula bar

The formula bar is located beneath the toolbar at the top of the Excel worksheet. Use the formula bar to enter and edit worksheet data. The contents of the active cell always appear in the formula bar. When you click the mouse in the formula bar, an X and a check mark appear. You can click the check icon to confirm and completes editing, or the X to abandon editing.

Name box

The Name box displays the reference of the selected cells.

Row and column headings

Letters and numbers identify the rows and columns on an Excel spreadsheet. The intersection of a row and a column is called a cell. Use row and column headings to specify a cell's reference. For example, the cell located where column B and row 7 intersect is called B7.

Active cell

The active cell has a dark border around it to indicate your position in the worksheet. All text and numbers that you type are inserted into the active cell. Click the mouse on a cell to make it active.

Fill handle

The lower right corner of the active cell has a small box called a Fill Handle. Your mouse changes to a cross-hair when you are on the Fill Handle. The Fill Handle helps you copy data and create series of information. For example, if you type January in the active cell and then drag the Fill Handle over four cells, Excel automatically inserts February, March, April and May.

Worksheet tabs

An Excel workbook consists of multiple worksheets. Use the worksheet tabs at the bottom of the screen to navigate between worksheets within a workbook.

Working with Excel documents

---

Opening and Closing Documents

To open an existing Excel workbook, choose Open from the File menu or click the Open tool on the toolbar.

Excel will display the Open dialog box, which is similar in appearance and function to the Save As dialog box. It contains a File Name: box for you to type a file name or file specification, a Look In: box to designate a location, and a drop-down menu of file types.

To open a file, select the appropriate location by clicking on the down pointing arrow next to the Look In: selection box. Excel will display all Excel files found there. Select the file you wish to open and click Open to open the file.

Saving a Document

The lower right corner of the active cell has a small box called a Fill Handle. Your mouse changes to a cross-hair when you are on the Fill Handle. The Fill Handle helps you copy data and create series of information. For example, if you type January in the active cell and then drag the Fill Handle over four cells, Excel automatically inserts February, March, April and May.

To save an untitled Excel workbook, from the File menu choose Save As or click the Save button on the toolbar (shown at right). The Excel Save As dialog box is the same as the Open dialog box above except it is labeled "Save As"

The Save As dialog box contains a text box for you to type a specific filename, a "Save File as Type:" box to save your workbook in a different format that other programs can read, a selection box to designate the folder and drive in which to save the file, and a "Places Bar" that offers other locations to save your file.

Difference between Save As and Save

Notice on the File menu there is a Save command and a Save As command. Use Save to save an existing workbook with the same name in the same location. Use Save As when you want to save a file with a different name or save it in a different location. For example, suppose you are working on a workbook called BUDGET.XLS. After you edit the workbook, you should save it again using the Save command. The Save command will replace the copy on the hard drive with what is in memory (what you see on your screen). At the end of the day, you might want to save a copy of the file on a diskette to take home. Choose Save As and select the proper drive in the Save As dialog box. This will create another copy of the file on your diskette.

Creating a New Workbook

The lower right corner of the active cell has a small box called a Fill Handle. Your mouse changes to a cross-hair when you are on the Fill Handle. The Fill Handle helps you copy data and create series of information. For example, if you type January in the active cell and then drag the Fill Handle over four cells, Excel automatically inserts February, March, April and May.

If you are already in Excel and you want to create a new workbook, choose New from the File menu or click the New tool on the toolbar. If you choose New from the file menu the Task Pane will open on the right side of the Excel worksheet. To create a blank workbook, click Blank Workbook in the Task Pane, and a new workbook opens.

Managing Multiple Workbooks

Excel enables you to have more than one workbook open simultaneously. Each open workbook appears on the Window menu. The document with the check next to it is the active document. To switch to another document, simply choose that document from the Window menu.
To navigate between worksheets within a workbook, click the worksheet tab you want to activate. Double-click a worksheet tab to change its name.

Entering and Editing Data

---

Entering Data

You can enter text, numbers and dates in an Excel worksheet. In Excel¹s terminology, numbers and dates are called values and text is referred to as a label. To enter data of any type, click on the cell you want to contain that data, and then type the information you want in the cell. When you begin typing, your data also appears in the formula bar. When you have finished typing the data for the active cell, press the Return or Enter key.

Editing Data

The easiest way to edit the contents of a cell is to select the cell and then retype the entry. The new entry replaces the old contents. For example, to change the number in cell B6 to 199, select cell B6, type 199 and press Return. This method works well with numbers, but is more difficult when editing long text labels or formulas.
The formula bar gives you more flexibility while editing. When the mouse pointer moves into the formula bar, it changes shape to an I-beam, signifying that you can enter or edit text. Text in the active cell appears in the formula bar and you can edit it there. Use the mouse to select the text you want to change in the formula bar and then type the new text. Excel automatically replaces what is selected. Don't forget to press the Return key when you finish editing a cell.
You can also edit labels and values directly in cells. Double-click on the cell you want to edit. This puts an insertion point in the cell. Edit the contents of that cell the same way you would using the formula bar.

Moving the Active Cell

Cell selection and movement around the worksheet are similar operations in Excel. To select a given cell or make it active, simply click on that cell. Use the mouse or the arrow keys to move around the worksheet. For example, if you press the right arrow key twice you move two cells to the right.
Refer to the table below for additional information on using the keyboard to navigate a worksheet.

To move	Press this key
One cell left	Left Arrow
One cell right	Right Arrow
One cell up	Up Arrow
One cell down	Down Arrow
To top of worksheet (cell A1)	Control Home
To last cell containing data	Control End
To end of data in a column	Control Down Arrow
To beginning of data in a column	Control Up Arrow
To end of data in a row	Control Right Arrow
To beginning of data in a row	Control Left Arrow

Go To Command

A quick way to move a large distance on a worksheet is with the Go To command on the Edit menu. When you select the Go To command, a dialog box prompts you to identify the cell. Enter the cell reference and click OK or press Return.

Clearing Cell Contents

To clear the contents of a cell choose Clear from the Edit menu. Then, select what you want to clear from the cell: All, Formats, Contents, or Notes. Most frequently you will want to clear the Contents of a cell. Pressing the Delete key also clears the contents of cells.

Undoing Mistakes

If you make a terrible mistake and you accidentally delete important data. Use the Undo command on the Edit menu or the Undo tool to correct the mistake.

Copying and Moving Data

Copy selected data from one cell to another with the Copy and Paste commands, or with the Drag and Drop procedure. If you want to move data instead, use the Cut and Paste commands, or the Drag and Drop procedure.
These commands and procedures are described below.

	Cut
	The Cut command extracts the selected data and puts it on the Clipboard, a temporary storage area. The contents of the Clipboard are overwritten with each copy or cut.
	Copy
	The Copy command puts a copy of the selected data on the Clipboard.
	Paste
	The Paste command inserts the Clipboard¹s contents into the active cell. Selected data is replaced by pasted text.
	Drag and Drop
	This procedure does not involve the Clipboard and works best when moving data a short distance. To move cells, position the mouse on the cell borders. Wait until the mouse changes to a left-pointing arrow. When the mouse is this shape, press and drag the data to the new location.

Formatting Data

---

Changing formats using the toolbar

In Excel, you can change text fonts and styles in the worksheet. Excel has a Formatting toolbar to simplify basic formatting tasks. The Formatting toolbar appears in the figure below.

The formatting toolbar has several tools you can use to change formats. The B button makes cells bold, the I button italicizes cells and the U button underlines. Use these buttons to turn formats off as well as on. For example, if cells are bold and you want to turn off that format, select the cells and click the B button. The toolbar also has buttons to change font and size.

Font tab in Format Cells

The formatting toolbar offers quick access to varying text formats. For a more complete selection of formatting options, use the Font tab in the Format Cells dialog box.
In the Font section you can select Font, Size, Style, Color and Effects. Notice the Preview area in the dialog box. This shows a preview of the font and style you select before you click the OK button.

Alignment

By default, Excel left-aligns labels and right-aligns values in a worksheet. You can change cell alignment using the toolbar or the Format Cells command.
The toolbar has text alignment icons next to the bold and italic icons. You can left-align, right-align, or center text within a cell using these buttons. Select the cell(s) you want to align and click the appropriate alignment button on the toolbar.

The toolbar also has a button that will center a label over a range of cells, for example centering a title over a report. To center data over a range of cells, select the cell you want to center and the columns you want to center it over and click the Center over Cells button (shown at right).

Format Alignment command

You can also change the alignment of data within cells using the Alignment section of the Format Cells dialog. This dialog box also has options to change the orientation of text (i.e. sideways or vertical) and a box to wrap text within a cell.

Changing Numeric Formatting

To change the format of a number, choose the Cells command from the Format menu. In the Format Cells dialog box, Excel displays different tabs for various formatting types. To change numeric formats, click the Number tab. Select the category you want and then the actual format. For example, to display numbers as currency with two decimal places, select the Currency category, enter 2 for the number of decimal places, and select the appropriate currency symbol. Or to display a number as a percentage, choose the Percentage category and select the number of decimals you want to display.

Placing borders around cells

The toolbar has a button for placing borders around cells. You can also use the Border section of the Format Cells dialog box, which provides more options. Select the cells you want a border on and choose the desired format from either the toolbar or the Format Cells dialog box.

Shading cells

To apply a specific pattern or color to a range of cells, use the Patterns section of the Format Cells dialog box. The sample area in the Patterns dialog box displays what the selected colors and patterns will look like. You can also apply a solid color using the Fill Color tool on the Formatting toolbar.

Changing column width with the Format menu

To change column width using the Format menu, select the column or columns you wish to change and choose Column then Width. In the Column Width dialog box, type a number for the width of the column. The number represents the number of characters that can fit in the cell. The default column width is 10, which means a column is wide enough for ten, Helvetica 10-point characters. Choose Best Fit to automatically widen a column to accommodate the widest label, or click the Hide button to hide the column completely. Hiding columns is useful when you have data that you do not want to print.

* Changing row height is similar to changing column width. Select the row(s) you wish to change and choose Row then Height from the Format menu.

Changing column widths by dragging column borders

You can change column widths by dragging column borders with the mouse. Move the mouse pointer to the right hand border of the column you wish to change. The mouse pointer will change shape to a left and right pointing arrow as seen below.
Click and drag the mouse to adjust the column width. Note that when you are adjusting the width in this way, a numeric width indicator appears in the upper left part of the formula bar.

Formulas and Functions

---

Formulas and functions that perform calculations are the true power of spreadsheets.

Formulas

To build a formula, first select the cell in which you want the results to appear. In Excel, all formulas start with the = sign. After the = sign, type the cells you want to add or subtract along with the mathematical operation you wish to perform. For example, to add the January sales in the worksheet below, the formula would be =B3+B4+B5. If you want to subtract February Widget Sales from January Widget sales, the formula would be =B3-C3.
Building many formulas can quickly become tedious. Fortunately, the Copy command described earlier also works with formulas.

Copying Formulas

The easiest way to copy a formula is with the Fill Handle in the lower right corner of the cell. Create your initial formula and then position the mouse on the Fill Handle. When the mouse changes shape to a cross-hair, press and drag over the adjacent cells you want to copy the formula to.

SUM( ) function

The SUM( ) function is probably the most common function in Excel. It adds a range of numbers. To build a SUM( ) function, begin by typing the = sign; all functions begin with the = sign. Next type the word SUM followed by an open parenthesis. You must now tell Excel which cells to sum. Using the mouse, click and drag over the range of cells you wish to add. A dotted outline will appear around the cells and the cell range will be displayed in the formula bar. When you have the correct cells selected, release the mouse button, type a closing parenthesis and press the <Enter> key.
If you do not want to use the mouse, type in the references of the cells you want to sum. For example, to add cells B3 through B5, type =SUM(B3:B5). Excel interprets B3:B5 as the range of cells from B3 to B5.

AutoSum button

In Excel, the standard toolbar has a button that simplifies adding a column or row of numbers. The AutoSum button, which resembles the Greek letter Sigma (shown at right), automatically creates a SUM( ) function. When you click the AutoSum button Excel creates a sum function for the column of numbers directly above or the row of numbers to the left. Excel pastes the SUM( ) function and the range to sum into the formula bar. If the range is not correct, simply select the proper range with your mouse on the worksheet. When you have the correct range entered, press the <Enter> key to complete the function.

Using the Insert Function Button

The Insert Function Button is located by the Formula Bar. Click the Insert funtion button in to activate the Insert Function dialog window.

First, choose the Function Category you are interested in from the select a category drop down menu.
Then select the function you want in that category. When you have selected the proper function click OK.
In the Function Arguements dialog box you specify the cells the function will operate on, which are called its arguments. Select the cells with the mouse and click OK. Notice the creation of the function in the formula bar.

Adjusting Page Setup settings

---

Before you actually print a worksheet, you should provide Excel information about margins, headers, footers, and page orientation. You change these settings using the Page Setup option on the File menu.
The Page Setup dialog box, shown below, has controls for margins, page orientation, headers and footers and whether gridlines and row and column heading should be printed.

To change page margins

To change your margins, click the Margins tab, and enter the measurement for your margin, in inches, in the appropriate text box.

To change page orientation

If you want to change the orientation of the page from portrait (vertical) to landscape (horizontal) click the appropriate button in the Page Orientation section of the Page tab.

To change the header or footer

A header is text that prints at the top of each page. A footer is text that prints at the bottom of each page. Headers and footers often include the name of the file being printed or an alternative title, the date, page number, or additional descriptive information. To change the header or footer, click on the Header /Footer tab in the Page Setup dialog box. The current header and footer will appear at the top and bottom of the dialog box respectively. Click the Custom Header or Custom Footer button to change the existing header or footer.
The header and footer are divided into three sections (left, center and right). Press <Tab> or <Shift Tab> to move from section of the header or footer to another.

Printing

---

Print preview

Before you actually print, it¹s a good idea to preview your output on the screen.Choose Print Preview on the File menu to preview your output on screen. Excel¹s Print Preview screen displays how the document will print on the page, but it is difficult to actually read the text. Notice that the mouse pointer takes the shape of a magnifying glass. You can enlarge the printed image by clicking the Zoom button or by using the magnifying glass. Simply click the magnifying glass on a part of the page you want to enlarge.

The Print Preview screen also has several buttons at the top of the screen for making adjustments. For example, the Setup button opens the Page Setup dialog box and the Margins button lets you change page margin and column widths to fit more information on one page.
If you are satisfied with how the output appears in the Print Preview screen, the Print button lets you send your output directly to the printer.

Sending your workbook to the printer

Choosing the Print option on the File menu or clicking the Print button on the toolbar opens a dialog box that lets you change print settings and specify the number of copies to print. The Print dialog box appears below.

Within the Print dialog box, you can select what you want to print, how many copies and which pages. For example, if you only want to print the selected cells, or the entire worksheet you can choose those options.

Getting Help

---

In the Help System, any topic that has additional information is underlined. To read the information about an underlined topic, click on the topic. The Help System automatically switches to information about the selected topic.

To expand to the full Help window, click the Show icon.

The Contents Tab

The Contents Tab is a listing of ³books² containing one or more Help topics and even some subbooks. You can open any of these books by double-clicking on it to get information about a topic.

The Answer Wizard Tab

Using the Answer Wizard is similar to using the Office Assistant. You can type in your question or the term you¹d like help on, click Search and a list of topics will be displayed. Information on the topic will appear in the right-hand window.

The Index Tab

The Index is an alphabetical listing of key words found in the Help topics. You can either type a word in the first text box or select a topic from the scrolling list displayed below. When you have selected a topic click on the Search button. A list of related topics is displayed in the third text box. Select the topic of your choice and information about that topic will appear in the right-hand window.